'Tis the Season

Deck the halls with boughs of holly, Fa la la la la la la la la.

'Tis the season to be jolly, Fa la la la la la la la la.

 

 

So begins a familiar traditional Christmas carol, sung to a peppy Welsh tune.  We often hear this carol in the malls and on the radio at this time of year, and perhaps sing it at our Christmas gatherings or when we go caroling.

 

We're in the season of Christmas songs. 

 

The season of holly and mistletoe.

 

The season of wreaths and red bows.

 

The season of candles and carols.

 

We're in the season of Advent.

 

Advent can be defined as a season of expectant waiting and preparation for celebrating the birth of Christ.  Many of the songs we sing at this time of year reflect that, particularly those we sing in our church services.  We sing about a Silent Night in a Little Town of Bethlehem when Angels from the Realms of Glory came to announce the nativity to a group of shepherds who were Watching Their Flocks by Night.

 

In addition those songs about the birth of the Christ Child, we sing about Santa Claus Coming to Town and about Frosty the Snowman and about Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer.  And we sing about Decking the Halls because "'tis the season to be jolly."

 

However, for many this season is anything but jolly.  There are those who are grieving the loss of a loved one.  Many are in the midst of health challenges.  Battling cancer.  Enduring chemotherapy.  Waiting for the biopsy to be scheduled and wondering what the results will be.  Besides the grief and the health issues, there are many facing serious economic challenges.  Downsizing at the work place.  Wondering if there will be enough money to give any Christmas gifts this year.  Facing the reality that there's more month than money. Top it off with political upheaval and terrorism around the world, and we're in a season that is anything but jolly.

 

The world in which we are living is not all that different from the world into which Jesus came.  The Roman Empire, not particularly known for their kindness and compassion, was in control of most of the known world.  Mary and Joseph, and the rest of their countrymen, found their lives disrupted by a government-required census, so that they had to travel from Nazareth to Bethlehem in order to be counted.  Mary and Joseph had already seen their lives turned upside down by the angel's announcement to Mary, and by seeing what the angel foretold fulfilled in Mary's pregnancy.  Life was not easy for Mary and Joseph, or for any one else, in those days.  It was not a particularly jolly time.

 

Yet into that world, Jesus was born.  Just as the angel Gabriel had told Mary it would happen.  Just as the prophets had foretold hundreds of years before.  Because "no word from God will ever fail." (Luke 1:37 NIV)

 

That's what we celebrate in this season of Advent.  That "no word from God will ever fail."  That Jesus came just as God had promised.  That all the prophecies concerning the birth of Jesus the Messiah have come true, just as God spoke them through the prophets.

 

We celebrate that "no word from God will ever fail" as we face our health crises and economic challenges and our bereavement and terrorism in the world and all the other difficulties that come our way.

 

And even as we celebrate this season of Advent, remembering Christ's coming to earth as a baby, to live a sinless life and then to die on a cruel Roman cross in order to pay the penalty for sin, for yours and mine and the sin of all the world, we also celebrate that there will be a second Advent.  Just as the prophets have foretold. 

 

Because "no word of God will ever fail."

 

'Tis the season for celebrating the first Advent.  'Tis also the season of anticipation and expectancy for the second Advent, as we await the return of our Lord to earth, as we are "looking for that blessed hope and the glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ."  (Titus 2:13 KJV)

 

"This Jesus, who has been taken up from you into heaven, will come in just the same way as you have watched Him go into heaven."  (Acts 1:11 NASB)

 

"In that day His feet will stand on the Mount of Olives....."  (Zechariah 14:4 NASB)

 

"And I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse, and He who sat on it is called Faithful and True....and on His robe and on His thigh He has a name written, 'KING OF KINGS AND LORD OF LORDS."  (Revelation 19:11, 16 NASB)

 

"Even so, come, Lord Jesus."  (Revelation 22:20 KJV)